Archive for March, 2009

We are massage therapists.  We are supposed to be very nurturing, but sometimes work can be a drag especially if you own the business. You get caught up in trying to be more productive and suddenly your life turns into a series of to-do lists. You measure of success by how much you accomplish. You even determine how happy you allow yourself to be by how much you’ve gotten done that day.

Suddenly work feels like a chore. You don’t enjoy giving massages anymore.  You just go through your day like a zombie, doing one massage after another, then doing all of the other projects that need to be done just so it can be over with. Then you can feel good, right? But wait, there’s that thing you forgot about. You still need to do that. And oh yeah, there’s that other thing you haven’t done yet.

Congratulations, you are a walking to-do list.

But work doesn’t have to be like that. The point of work – even giving massages – shouldn’t be just to finish. The point of work should be the work itself. That’s the way it’s supposed to be anyway.

We spend a lot of time trying to find ways to be more productive. To do things faster, better, cheaper and spend our time more effectively. But instead of just doing more in less time, maybe we should focus on actually enjoying the work we’re doing instead.  I mean, why did we become massage therapists in the first place?

Here are 8 ways to make work seem like less of a chore and more like a gift:

1. Follow your natural rhythms. A lot of the time I resent working is because I’m trying to force myself to do something I don’t feel like doing. Naturally there will always be some things you’re not crazy about doing (like doing taxes). But how often do you force yourself to work more, when you really want to relax? When you force yourself to work when you’ve promised yourself a break, you’ll likely just end up distracting yourself with other things and put off working or you will work taking on that one last massage of the day but your heart won’t be in it. Then you get stressed and end up resenting work. Instead, follow your natural rhythms. When you feel like working, work. When you don’t, don’t. Don’t over complicate things.

2. Do, don’t think. I’m going to stay true to this point and not think about writing something elaborate. Just do, stop thinking about it. Fail, make corrections later.

3. Don’t put sugar in your tank. You wouldn’t put sugar in your gas tank right? It doesn’t make much sense to fill your body up with unhealthy fuel either. If you don’t have the energy to get the work you need to done, work will feel forced.

4. Remove hidden roadblocks. What’s making you avoid working? What’s making your work seem like drudgery rather than joyful? It might have something to do with your beliefs about yourself. Maybe you believe you’re not good enough, not smart enough or don’t have enough experience. Question your beliefs about what you can and can’t do.

5. Only do your best. Work can easily become a chore when you’re trying to constantly be perfect. The truth is some of your work might not be so great. You may not relate to a particular client.  You may be second-guessing what your client’s fidgeting on the table means.  If you can accept that and just do your best, you stop judging yourself. Guess what it feels like when you’re no longer picking over everything you do with a fine toothed comb? It feels extremely liberating. It feels like you can actually enjoy your experience, rather than worrying about how everything is going to turn out. That is working effortlessly.

6. Follow your intuition. When you think you have a great idea, believe it. Follow it. Chase it until you’re out of breath and can barely hold yourself up. If you don’t trust yourself, you’ll regret it later.

7. Focus on what matters. Our minds are constantly pulling us in different directions. We have a tendency to follow what’s urgent instead of what’s important. In order to get the important things done, we have to be ruthless at removing distractions. If it takes bringing a laptop (or notepad) to a cafe to write your book, then do that.  Remove all distractions so you can focus on the important things.

8 Refuse to do what you don’t want to do. I often avoid working because I’m trying to do things I think I “should do.” Forget what you think you should do Do what you want to do. Other people will understand. In fact, they’ll probably envy you.

Sometimes we can become so focused on our business with all of the hats that we wear as Practitioner, Accountant, Marketer, Webmaster that we forget to have a little fun.  You know the old adage, “All work and no play, makes you very dull.”

In order to avoid burnout, I suggest you do take time for yourself and have some fun.  “FUN” is like “SUCCESS”.  Everyone has their own definition for it.  But allow me to give you some suggestions that will hopefully foster your own ideas of fun:

·                    Have a picnic with your significant other

·                    Go to the movies with your significant other

·                    Take your kids to the movies

·                    Play with your animals

·                    Take a nap

·                    Listen to music

·                    Go shopping (If you don’t have the money, don’t go on a shopping spree but the purchase of a special item would be a nice thing to do for yourself.)

·                    Do your hobby (Don’t have a hobby?  Take up one.  Here are some of mine to get you thinking about what you might like to do.  Cooking Photography, Card Making, Creative Memories Scrap booking, dancing)

·                    Play your favorite sport

·                    Take up a new sport

·                    Take a long walk

·                    Go dancing

Another thought as I close this Success Strategy is that you must allow yourself a vacation.  I talk to so many Massage Therapists who haven’t been on vacation in years.  This is not good.  We must allow ourselves downtime to relax, rejuvenate and re-group (I get some of my best business/marketing ideas while on vacation or right after coming back).

You might be saying to yourself, “Yeah, that would be nice, but I can’t afford a vacation.”  Whether it is a monetary issue or a feeling that you can’t be away from your clients, my answer to both, is that you can’t afford not to take a vacation.

Your clients go on vacation and expect that you will do the same.  They will be there when you return.  Now, I will admit that my first year in business, I didn’t take a vacation and I worked 7 days a week and very long hours.  My second year in business, I was only able to take a few mini vacations (3-5 days).  By the third year, I was back to taking a couple of weeks a year.  However, my last few years in my practice, I took between 4-7 weeks vacation per year and didn’t lose one client because of it.  Planning is all you need.

As far as the monetary issue goes, there are lots of ways to take inexpensive vacations.  How do you think that I can afford to go on 4-7 weeks vacation per year?  You may want to look into the following:

·                    Renting a week timeshare on Web sites like e-Bay.  A lot of times you can get very inexpensive weeks that way because people who own timeshares aren’t able to use one of their weeks so they usually just sell it for their yearly maintenance fee.

·                    House swap.  There are lots of Web sites out there catering to people who want to swap there house for yours (some are free to join but some involve a fee to become a member.)

·                    Receive emails from last minute travel deal Web sites like www.TravelZoo.com.  I get these emails weekly and you wouldn’t believe the incredible deals.